V o l um e 2 I s s ue 1 0
De s P la i n e s Va l l e y Re gi o n E F E 0 3 0
May 2011
DVR D IGEST
INSIDE THIS ISSUE: O B A M A : S T E M E D U C A T I O N A M U S T - H AV E
eSchool News hall event held on Face- and career-ready stu-
2 April 21, 2011 book's Palo Alto, Calif. dents, Obama said.
Video Games as a Learning Tool
campus. Emphasizing http://
Science, technology, engi- STEM education— www.eschoolnews.com/
neering, and math (STEM) especially to girls and mi- 2011/04/21/obama-stem
Teacher Promotes Environmental education is of the utmost nority students–is one of -education-a-must-have/
2
Awareness in School importance to all students the most important efforts
and is critical to U.S. com- the U.S. can make if it
Arne Duncan Urges CTE to 2 petitiveness, said President hopes to produce college-
Prove its Worth Obama at an April 20 town
Core Steps for Success 3
HIGH-SCHOOL STUDENTS WANT MORE
Hiring Tech Workers at Rapid p 3 C A R E E R G U I DA N C E , P O L L S H OW S
Pace
ASCD SmartBrief provide enough guidance chools and http://
NIMS Revises national Guide- 3 April 20, 2011 in helping them choose a www.chicagotribune.com
lines Standards for Apprentice- career path or college and /news/nationworld/sns-
ships Most young adults between did not provide enough bc-us--appoll-
ages 18 to 24 give high information on securing grading-
Using Everyday Engineering 4
schools poor marks when it financial assistance. Ya- theschools,0,1588397.st
Examples in the Classroom comes to preparing them hoo!/The Associated Press ory and http://
for college and the work- (4/19) http:// www.acteonline.org/
4
force, according to a poll by news.yahoo.com/s/ ctepolicy-
Gates, Pearson Partner to Align
The Associated Press and ap/20110419/ watchblog.aspx?
online Courses to Common Core
Viacom. Many students ap_on_re_us/ id=16068&blogid=3512
said their schools did not us_ap_poll_grading_the_s
How to Increase the Focus on 4
Engineering in STEM Education NEW REPORT: COMMUNITY COLLEGE
A T T E N DA N C E Y I E L D S E C O N O M I C A N D
Credits: SOCIAL BENEFITS
CTE Works-Electronic CTE Policy Watch Blog As the article notes, de- cial benefits, from commu-
Resources
April 22, 2011 spite the ―methodological nity college attendance
ASCD Smartbrief A recent article in the Com- challenges associated with ―appears to be compel-
munity College Review ana- calculating earnings gains ling.‖ http://
The Des Plaines Valley Region and its lyzed the existing literature from attending a commu- www.acteonline.org/
member schools are equal opportunity
institutions and do not discriminate on the
on the economic, health nity college,‖ the evidence ctepolicywatchblog.aspx?
basis of race, color, religion, sex, age, and social benefits of at- for significant earnings id=16080&blogid=3512
national origin or disabilities. tending community college. gains, as well as other so-
P age 2 V o l um e 2 I s s ue 1 0
NEUROLOGIST MAKES THE CASE FOR THE
VIDEO GAME MODEL AS A LEARNING
TOOL
“Day by day, what you Judy Willis MD player effort and practice -student-engagement-judy-
choose, what you think, Edutopia with acknowledgement of willis
and what you do is who incremental goal progress,
April 20, 2011
you become.”
not just final product. The
Heraclitus The popularity of video fuel for this process is the
games is not the enemy of pleasure experience re-
education, but rather a lated to the release of do-
model for best teaching pamine.
strategies. Games insert
players at their achievable http://www.edutopia.org/
challenge level and reward blog/video-games-learning
T E AC H E R ' S I D E A P RO M O T E S
E N V I R O N M E N T A L A WA R E N E S S A T S C H O O L S
“Though no one can Accomplished Teacher by Mike Town established the environment and saving
go back and make a SmartBrief Cool School Challenge in districts money.
brand new start, April 22, 2011 2007 in which participating
anyone can start Edutopia.org/Suzie Boss'
from now and make schools agree to reduce
A high-school teacher's blog (4/21) http://
a brand new their carbon footprint
idea to help schools be www.edutopia.org/blog/
ending.” through in-school competi-
environmentally friendly earth-day-challenge-
tions. He described the
demonstrates what hap- teacher-innovation-
Carl Bard challenge as win-win --
pens when "teacher inno- sustainable-suzie-boss
providing STEM lessons
vation becomes a sustain-
for students, helping the
able resource," Suzie Boss
writes in this blog. Teacher
A R N E D U N C A N U RG E S C T E T O P ROV E I T S
WORTH
Catherine Gewertz meeting of the National administration proposed
Education Week Association of State Direc- for 2012, cut Perkins fund-
April 20, 2011 tors of Career Technical ing, a key source of sup-
In an effective class-
U.S. Secretary of Educa- Education Consortium and port for CTE programs.
room students should tion Arne Duncan urged the U.S. Office of Voca- And he said that in tight
not only know what they the career and technical tional and Adult Education. budget times, programs
are doing, they should education community this As prepared for delivery, need to prove that they
also know why and how. morning to upgrade its pro- the speech abounds with work.
grams to prove they are support for new-age CTE,
"worthy investments" as but it could also come http://tiny.cc/18p84 and
- Harry Wong federal funding for such across as a warning. He http://www.acteonline.org/
offerings grows tighter. reminded his audience that ctepolicywatchblog.aspx?
Duncan's comments were the federal budget negoti- id=16064&blogid=3512
part of an address he gave ated for fiscal year 2011,
this morning at a joint and the one the Obama
D V R D ig e s t P age 3
CORE STEPS FOR SUCCESS
PEN Weekly NewsBlast literacy skills from birth states in improving literacy
April 22, 2011 through grade 12 by pro- instruction; support and “One must learn by doing
A new policy brief from the viding systemic ap- invest in increasing the the thing, for though you
Alliance for Excellent Edu- proaches, equitable re- quality of teacher educa- think you know it, you
cation calls for federal sup- sources, and strong tion and professional de- have no certainty until
port of state literacy plans teacher training. The brief velopment; and invest in you try.”
aligned to ELA Common also suggests ways that ongoing research and Sophocles
Core Standards, so that federal policymakers can evaluation.
students, regardless of support literacy improve- http://www.all4ed.org/
where they live, can gradu- ment plans: encourage publication_material/
ate from high school ready adoption of college- and issue_policy_briefs
for college and the modern career-readiness stan-
workplace. The brief offers dards in English language
recommendations for lev- arts and aligned assess-
eraging improvement in ments; enhance the role of
C O M PA N I E S H I R I N G T E C H W O R K E R S A T
R A P ID P AC E “Tell me and I forget.
Teach me and I remember.
ACTE Career Tech offering high salaries and a that could eventually make
Update variety of extras designed a dent in the national un- Involve me and I learn.”
April 21, 2011 "to hook top talent in engi- employment rate of 8.8%."
neering, social media, Benjamin Franklin
USA Today (4/21, Swartz) website development, http://www.usatoday.com/
reports, "Tech work- product design and man- tech/news/2011-04-20-
ers...are coveted com- agement." Experts say tech-jobs-booming.htm
modities as the high-tech "the jump in tech hires
industry undergoes its big- highlights what some
gest hiring binge in more economists see as a
than a decade," with com- bounce-back in the $805
panies vying for talent by billion US tech industry
N IMS R E VISE S N AT ION AL G UID EL INE
S TA N DA R D S F O R 2 1 S T C E N T U RY
APPRENTICESHIP
Workforce3One pations including Machin- NIMS will implement the
April 20, 2011 ist, CNC Machinist, Tool new apprenticeships on a
and Die Maker, Mold national basis and has
The Expert Panel of the Maker, CNC Operator and been preparing the Preci-
National Institute for Metal- Press Set-Up Operator. sion Manufacturing Indus-
working Skills (NIMS) has The revisions to the cur- try for the roll-out of the
finalized the competencies rent NIMS Guideline Stan- new standards in the third
that will be at the heart of dards will be submitted to quarter of 2011.
the National Guidelines for the Office of Apprentice-
Apprentice Standards for ship for certification. Fol- http://tiny.cc/pp9ab
NIMS Competency-Based lowing the Office of Ap-
Apprenticeship in six occu- prenticeship certification,
A n n e J . Co t h r a n , Ed .D.
Di r ect o r
Des P la i n es V a lley R egi o n
EF E 030
c/o Triton College, Building M, M100
2000 N. Fifth Ave
River Grove, Illinois 60171-1907
708-779-4448
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708-779-4627 fax
http://www.dvr-efe.org/ I N M E - U S I N G E V E R Y D AY E N G I N E E R I N G
EXAMPLES IN THE CLASSROOM WEBINAR
RECORDING
Presented by Eann Patter- in the classroom to illus- 4 14 no notes.ppt
son, Ph.D. to ASME trate everyday engineering
(American Society of Me- examples, engage stu- Everyday Examples in Engi-
chanical Engineers) mem- dents, and help improve neering: http://
DVR Member Districts & bers, the webinar includes their performance. http:// www.engageengineering.or
Board of Directors valuable results from a www.wepanknowledgecen g/?page=40
pilot study on engineering ter.org/c/journal_articles/
Dr. Douglas Rudig students, the essential at- view_article_content?
Superintendent tributes of everyday engi- groupId=1010&articleId=1
Elmwood Park District 401 neering examples (E3s), 722&version=1.0&p_l_id=
and examples of specific PUB.1.81 Power
activities that can be done Point: ASME E3 Webinar
Dr. Kathryn Robbins
Superintendent
Leyden HS District 212 G A T E S , P E A R S O N PA R T N E R T O A L I G N
Dr. Steven Isoye
ONLINE COURSES WITH THE COMMON CORE
Superintendent
Oak Park & River Forest HS
Two education foundations and will include video, so- textbooks -- online or oth-
District 200
said Wednesday they are cial media, games and erwise -- with the new
working to develop 24 new other digital materials. The standards and may posi-
online reading and math Bill & Melinda Gates Foun- tion Pearson as a leader in
Dr. Nettie Collins-Hart courses that will be aligned dation will provide $3 mil-
Superintendent with the common core na- lion for four of the courses the market. The New York
Proviso Twp. HS District tional standards. The to be offered free to Times ( tiered subscription
209 courses will be developed schools. The initiative ap- model ) ( 4/27 ) , MSNBC/
by the Pearson Foundation pears to be the most ambi-
-- associated with the ma- tious effort so far to align The Associated Press
Dr. Robert Lupo
Superintendent and jor textbook company --
FY11 DVR Board President
Ridgewood HS District 234 H OW TO IN CR E A SE T HE FO C U S O N
E NG INE ERING IN S TEM ED UCAT ION
Dr. David Bonnette
Superintendent Educator Eric Brunsell sources for developing science and technology
Riverside-Brookfield HS writes in this blog about engaging engineering les- skills, and promote engi-
District 208 the increased emphasis sons for students. He also neer-like thinking that in-
being placed on engineer- looks at the principles cludes characteristics such
Dr. Patricia Granados ing as part of K-12 sci- found in a 2009 report that as collaboration and crea-
Triton College ence, technology, engi- suggested engineering tivity. Edutopia.org/Eric
neering and math educa- lessons should emphasize Brunsell's blog (4/25)
tion, and recommends re- design, incorporate math,